July 5, 2012

And if you're thinking clearly you'll say: Wait, what does that mean? You mean if the Higgs boson disappeared, then the other particles would exist but wouldn't have mass? So how could they be particles at all--I mean, how could they be particles in the sense that I think of "particles"?

What's your position on the Higgs boson?

I understand what it is.

I have some understanding, and I'm trying competently to further my understanding.

I understand it in a general, spiritual way that I find adequate and even satisfying.

I'm doing a pretty lame job of trying to understand it.

I see the headlines, am glad somebody's figuring out that sort of thing. It's not my job.

I'm annoyed by the headlines trying to get my interest, and I don't care.

I avoid this topic, which seems to have to do with putting science where God belongs.

I'm just trying to understand whether I need to understand before I invest the time and energy in re-learning / supplementing my learning enough in physics to be conversationally proficient, which would be my goal.

I tried to read an article on Slate purporting to explain why it was so important, but found it unreadable. My husband, who watches those physics type shows on Discovery and is completely into this sort of thing, is very excited about it, though.

Part of my capcha is "42", which seems so apt for this topic (to the extent to which I understand what the topic is here).

All the particles of matter have some kind of property that lets them behave in different ways. These properties are carried by other particles. For example, photons are the particle that give rise to the electric charges of particles. And Higgs bosons would be the particle that is responsible for giving other particles its mass in the same way that photons are responsible for charge.

Why does anything have what we call "mass"? Why do material things resist being accelerated by forces? That's the question that the Higgs boson intends to answer.

If it is what is supposed to be, asking what would happen to mass if it disappeared is literally contradictory, since mass would not be a property independent of the Higgs boson.

You mean if the Higgs boson disappeared, then the other particles would exist but wouldn't have mass? So how could they be particles at all--I mean, how could they be particles in the sense that I think of "particles"?

Somebody flunked high school physics. Photons are massless particles, and have been well known for over a century.

I would say, "If The Higgs boson is the particle that imparts mass to the other particles and we already know that other particles have mass, why did we waste billions of dollars to find out that this "particle" exists?"

One of the wisest things ever said to me in my physics education was, "You don't ever really understand physics, you just get used to it". I was told this when I was bothered by the quantum nature of particles.

That's not really the whole story, because as you get used to it you can learn to understand it. But you first you have to unlearn many things you think you know.

The biggest challenge of teaching introductory physics is not that students don't know anything about physics. It's that they know a great deal of WRONG physics, which they have constructed for themselves from their experiences of the physical world over their lifetime. Once you have mastered physics it is very difficult to remember the misconceptions you once had, since they don't make sense any more.

@dpb:I would say, "If The Higgs boson is the particle that imparts mass to the other particles and we already know that other particles have mass, why did we waste billions of dollars to find out that this "particle" exists?"

Yeah, there is clearly no value in understanding the way the universe works, dpb said, typing out his words on a machine that could never have been designed without an understanding of quantum particles, words that are transmitted to others that could never have been done without an understanding of how photons work.

If the particle exists, physics is on the right track. If it can't be found, physics is on the wrong track and needs to be rethought. No value in that, I guess.

Imagine higgs as a field that permeates everything, like gravity. It's everywhere. Any particle that comes into existence has to pass through it. Some are more influenced than others by it. Those that are greatly influenced by it are heavier. The idea now is, are their multiple ways to get to a higgs?

I wanted an option of "I sort of understand, but I'm not breaking my brain on trying to understand it better." A combination of #2 and #5.

As for Wright. I suppose he makes people who don't understand it feel better, but what's the point of that? Where does the feeling bad come into it? He's not a scientist, and certainly not a physicist, and even among those, how many work at that level?

I don't have the conceptual space for needing to feel better for not understanding it. I don't expect to, so where is the problem?

OTOH, my brain doesn't cramp at the thought of a field creating mass or being associated with a particle or a particle not being a particle, etc.

The conclusion that the human brain isn't meant to understand anything but the crudest macroscopic truths and so we ought to be *humble* seems... like an excuse.

Mass-less particles like photons bother you? How about this. The whole universe came from, well nothing, according to one theory. Another theory is it came from some being who came from, well who knows.

Or, what about that conscious you think you've got going. Like the universe's origin, you have three choices:

It comes about all at once for who knows what reasonIt's in everything (use the force)Or, it doesn't actually exist.

Mass is stuff. What we call the world. It seems to be a process that is passing us by as our linear time sees the world as real or unreal.

There are also red, green or blue colored quarks and muons on the Creator Artist's palette for use in His intelligent designs of atoms' nucleus.

But a Higgs bosun is like a field of "particles" in space that binds some of the other particles to slow them down which then makes them seem like they have a heavy mass, or not binds as strongly to others to make them seem like they have a lesser mass.

The boson itself doesn't do much, but with all of the other Higgs bosons, creates a field. Without that field, other particles move about with impunity and remain mass-less. The field creates a "drag" effect, so that the particles experience resistance, which is defined as "mass." If there were no Higgs field, there would be no mass.

Next option: It's great that some people are throughly engaged with discovery, but it's a virtual certainty much of what they claim will turn out to be materially wrong in ways we won't even understand for several decades, so the triumphalism is completely misplaced. _________________________

Oh, and the Atlantic sucks with McArdle gone, Fallows claiming the Democratic process is a coup if it doesn't result in greater leftism, and Coates claiming both (a) that Al Gore's restraint after the 2000 election was commendable and (b) that a 1/2 second grainy security tape from 30 yards away proved Zimmerman guilty because there was no visible damage.

"Photons are massless particles, and have been well known for over a century."

Gabriel's physics may be a more recent revision. The massless nature of photons is an inference based on how they behave, and on our current understanding of physical laws. The existence of the Higgs Boson would change that understanding and may require us to re-evaluate our conclusions.

Which is why science is never really "known". At best it's just a working approximation.

@Synova:The conclusion that the human brain isn't meant to understand anything but the crudest macroscopic truths and so we ought to be *humble* seems... like an excuse.

It can be understood, at the expense of a great deal of effort and with the help of mathematics, which gives us the appropriate language for the problem.

It can be restated in English, but then you only get a statement of the results, and not the process of reasoning that justified them. And that statement may not be convincing.

One hurdle for students who first hear of relativity is that they think this is just an artifact of how we measure time, and not the nature of time itself. Following the mathematical reasoning is what makes it convincing.

So how could they be particles at all--I mean, how could they be particles in the sense that I think of "particles"?

Exactly. They are not "particles" in the sense that you think of "particles." They are probably closer to different forms of energy than particles like normal people think of when they hear the word "particles." Those subatomic thingamabobs are some pretty weird shit.

At least Wright understands that it is the Higgs Field which is important, and the Higgs particle is a manifestation of a ripple, the smallest possible ripple since this is a quantum field, in the Higgs Field. It turns out to be very hard to make a ripple in the Higgs Field. It takes a lot of energy, which is why we need the LHC to smash things together a almost the speed of light. It is hard to observe the wave/particle, because in a very short time the wave's energy disturbes other fields (which creates other particles) and the ripple in the Higgs Field vanishes. Those other ripples do survive and move through detectors where we can see them, and if the right kinds of ripples (or particles) are seen, we infer the earlier presence of a ripple in the Higgs Field, and so we know the Higgs Field exists!

The Higgs Field is present everywhere, and unlike other fields, has a nonzero value in empty space. Particles that interact with, or 'feel', the Higgs Field are affected by it everywhere! The interaction produces the property we call mass, just as interaction with the Electric Field produces the property we call charge. Particles that do not interact with the Electric Field have no charge, and particles that do not interact with the Higgs Field have no mass.

We know almost nothing about the Higgs Field except it must have a nonzero value everywhere, and now we know that it exists. The interesting part will be learning more about the Higgs Field and maybe one day how to engineer things which use the Higgs Field.

Little mistake here:"For example, photons are the particle that give rise to the electric charges of particles."

Photons couple to the charges of charged particles and produce the electric and magnetic fields we know and love--as well as light. You could argue that charges and photons arise within the context of the field theory, but that's a different matter. So to speak.

I don't know if this'll help anyone, but I'll put it out there anyway:

For the average person, it's sometimes helpful to not worry about how nonsensical elementary particles are when described in isolation, but rather to understand that they're part of an overall puzzle, and that the particles are only meaningful when they're considered in context with the other fields or particles in the standard model. Fermions add up to matter, bosons add up to forces, and the Higgs boson ends up being the components of the "Higgs field" that makes something have mass. If something has mass, it's affected by the Higgs field and therefore interacts somehow with the Higgs boson. The specific "hows" and "whys" are the province of physicists who are trying to understand things at a deep level, but the fact that those particles either add up to either eventually being solid matter, some sort of force, or makes things have mass or not is deep enough for me. Any further and my innumeracy in higher math ends up hampering me.

And as an aside: Yeah, obviously I voted for #3: I understand it in a general, spiritual way, but no deeper, and I'm happy where I'm at. That poll choice was oddly on target in my case. :D

Anyway, thinking about it that way helps me cope most of the time. And when it doesn't, normally doing Google searches for "(topic of interest) for dummies" helps a lot. In this case, "Higgs boson for dummies" turned up some excellent links. :)

I am sure it would be edifying, as well as entertaining to have Mr. Gabriel Hanna said take us all through the steps whereby smashing atoms led to flat screen displays and microciruitry.

Sure, it is nice to find out a "particle" which has been used for lots of calculations and predictions does actually exist--though there must have been lots of other evidence for it or else we wouldn't have spent billions on an accelerator.

The result will be interesting--mostly to physists, who will find that they need a machine ten times more powerful to find the next "god" particle.

When I was a kid in Middleton, my mom used to point to a building off to the right heading north on highway 12 and say "that's an atom smasher." I forgot to ask her about that when I was back. Are there any locals around here who know what she might have been referring to back in the 1960's?

An early written description of the Higgs bosun field effect appears in Colossians 1:17 that describes the Eternal Christ (who is God) saying, "He is before all things and in him all things hold together."

traditionalguy said...An early written description of the Higgs bosun field effect appears in Colossians 1:17 that describes the Eternal Christ (who is God) saying, 'He is before all things and in him all things hold together.'

urinortWhen I was a kid in Middleton, my mom used to point to a building off to the right heading north on highway 12 and say "that's an atom smasher." I forgot to ask her about that when I was back. Are there any locals around here who know what she might have been referring to back in the 1960's?

Yeah, the atom smasher. That was where they smashed atoms. They'd show up for work with their hammers, smash atoms all day on the line, maybe go get a beer after work. Tough bunch they were, and they always split the atoms clean.

I don't care. I know I'm supposed to care, but I don't care. And yes, I'm aware of the dangers of feeling perfectly sheepish when someone mentions, in casual conversation, something about the Standard Model (because that sort of thing happens all the time) and I say, "The damn thing isn't even complete, by Jove!" and they have to correct me and say, "Au contraire--for the Higgs booooson has been identified!" *guffaw*

I like trivia very much, mind. I find stuffing my noodle with useless horseshit quite edifying. But I think an inch-deep-mile-wide understanding of particle physics is enough for anyone to get by. I mean, great, someone's close to identifying the Higgs boson. And awesome, you're vaguely aware of its importance. But if you think I'm going to sit around for a 48-minute lecture on the Higgs boson's place in the Standard Model, you can go fuck yourself with the now defunct Fermilab particle smasher.

Oh, I can imagine it. It would only be in my mind though: Historically there is no significant connection between atom smashers and electronics--Perhaps the state of art was pushed forward just to make sensitive detectors or some such thing.

@dbp, I am sure it would be edifying, as well as entertaining to have Mr. Gabriel Hanna said take us all through the steps whereby smashing atoms led to flat screen displays and microciruitry.

Can't explain that bit very well...it depends on half-remembered stuff about how quantum-level effects produce the behavior of NPN and PNP junctions in transistors...or was it FETs?

Anyway, quantum theory (which was developed before atom-smashers were widely used, I think) explains why the semiconductor-junctions in transistors behave in certain ways.

For the stuff that I consider more important: there was an elegant logical-expression system developed by a 19th-Century professor. That system was used to develop electronic computing devices from large numbers of electronic switches.

Early computers used vacuum tubes as part of the switching apparatus. Transistors allowed computers to be built out of smaller components.

So, if the Higgs field and Higgs boson particles create drag, which we understand as mass, on anything other than a electron/photon, would an anti-Higgs pocket allow us to slip, massless, through the universe at the speed of light? Or would it just make us dissolve? Poof!

Can't explain that bit very well...it depends on half-remembered stuff about how quantum-level effects produce the behavior of NPN and PNP junctions in transistors...or was it FETs?

You don't need quantum theory to explain bipolar transistors or FETs. FETs rely on electric fields affecting the charge carriers present in a doped semiconductor. Bipolar transistors work similarly to diodes in that the potential difference between the differently doped sections of the semiconductor affects the depletion zone width and thus controls current flow.

You may be thinking of flash memory, which uses insulated-gate FETs to store bits. These gates are charged and discharged by electrons which pass through the insulation barrier via quantum tunneling. Having said that, the ability of electrons to pass though insulators has been known for a while but I think it took quantum mechanics to explain exactly how and why it happns.

Bipolar transistors work similarly to diodes in that the potential difference between the differently doped sections of the semiconductor affects the depletion zone width and thus controls current flow.

Lithium ions probably help those electronic mood swings. :)

Protons, and to lesser extent deuterons are known to tunnel through thin barriers.

@Original Mike linked: In 1965 Ray together with J. A. Ferry and T. Pauly founded the National Electrostatics Corporation, which was to manufacture pelletron electrostatic accelerators. The company was located in Middleton Wisconsin, a town adjacent to Madison.

I believe that's a bingo, Mike!--though I'm not sure about the appellation "atom smasher." That's what she called it anyway. Sorry I don't have a link for that, Allie. :)

Phrosty the Photon was quite a quantum sight,With a zero mass and an endless life, and a speed approaching light.Phrosty the Photon says he knows he's not that large,But he said one day, if he comes this way, he will give us all a charge.

There must have been some magic in a physics lab one year,For when they studied X-Ray beams, old Phrosty did appear,Ooooooh...

Phrosty the Photon was quite a quantum sight,With a zero mass and an endless life, and a speed approaching light.Phrosty the Photon says he knows he's not that large,But he said one day, if he comes this way, he will give us all a charge.

The biggest problem is that these types of things make sense as mathematical constructs for the 1/10 of 1% who understand them. However, they cannot make sense with the human brain's abilities to paint a picture of the universe. It is clearly built on a different level.

But I have listened to Morgan Freeman explain wormholes and dark matter until the cartoons on the screen seemed real.

These guys must be on to something. Only 72 years ago was no one thought thermo-nuclear devices were a practical advance in weapons. And now everyone wants one...for peaceful electrical power, of course...they must be planning to electrocute the six million Jews this time.

But on August 7, 1945 1,000,000 American Marines, Sailors and Soldiers and 4,000,000+ Japanese Soldiers and civilians woke up greatful that the Jew haters of their day ran Leo Szilard and Albert Einstein out of Germany.

Tradguy, I doubt those Japanese civilians were grateful. And Oppenheimer did the heavy lifting at Los Alamos along with many others. Szilard conceived the chain reaction but was a persona non grata on the bomb project.

@Chickelit...The Japanese knew what just happened to Japaneses civilians 2 months before at Okinawa Prefecture. They were very relieved that Emperor decided to let their lives count for something for the first time.

And you say Leo Szilard only thought of the solution to the problem, but others worked on it after him. OK. That's what Professor Higgs did. (Some Bose guy was also honored,) but Higgs pionerred the new theoretical physics that we are analogizing to Leo Szilard's world changing revelation and work to bring his revelation here and tell FDR about its potential as a weapon.

The most famous bosun was Decatur's bosun, Reuben James. The navy named a ship after him, several in fact. One of them sank in WWII and the Kingston Trio immortalized it. That song inspired another song by Kenny Rogers.

I went to wikipedia to try to understand it...and I read this (the first paragraph):

"In the Standard Model of particle physics, the Higgs boson is a hypothetical elementary particle. ... The Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, ... was designed with the primary purpose of finding and characterizing the Higgs boson."

Showing exactly why science is no more true than anything else. How can you "find" a "hypothetical particle"? In other words, how do you know if what you've found is the thing you hypothesized?

Gabriel Hanna said... @Bryan:Gabriel's physics may be a more recent revision.

I didn't say that, but I agree with this:

The massless nature of photons is an inference based on how they behave, and on our current understanding of physical laws.

The existence of the Higgs Boson would change that understanding and may require us to re-evaluate our conclusions.

Change that to "may" and I'm with you.

Which is why science is never really "known". At best it's just a working approximation.

Which is like saying that the Mona Lisa is at best an interesting arrangement of organic pigments on cloth.

All I know is that there is a whackin' great ring thingy in the ground not far from where I live what was used for the acceleratin of various particles of matter. At great speed I might add. And now it ain't. 'cause some scientific geezer said it weren't doin the job of accountin for all the mass in the universe, or the lack thereof and so the science toffs built a bigger one in Europe or someplace. On account of the mass. or lack there of.It's got buffalo in it.The ring I mentioned.grazin' I think.Increasin' their mass.

I don't have enough faith in leading-edge physics to care much about Higgs-Boson. There may be something to it, but I'd rather spend my limited time looking very carefully at the to me beautiful parts of physics that are already done very well (like, electromagnetism) and see whether I can figure out how to do it even better.

About a decade ago I noticed there's an intuitive way of rewriting the potential energy density of the electromagnetic field if the speed of light squared times the cross product of the magnetic potential with the magnetic field minus the product of the scalar potential with the electric field has some sort of significance (e.g., if its time partial derivative is conserved when integrated globally). That's pretty much my only interest (or obsession) physics-wise that isn't just learning what is beautiful that is already known. But I've spent several hundreds of hours banging my horns at it to no effect, so, though I may spend a day or so each year revisiting it, I mostly just do mathematical logic, where I actually know I can make (slow but steady) progress, and which is more fundamental anyway, and which, who knows, might improve my understanding of math and thought such as to eventually lead to a better understanding of physics. In my experience, it tends to be better to be patiently lazy about such things, not letting attempts get ahead of insights and intimations, and not letting artificial goals direct oneself otherwise than wherever the unpredictable intimations of insight and beauty happen to be pointing at the moment.

gerry wrote: Were transistors developed as a result of really smart guys at Bell Labs thinking about how to apply that theory?

Absolutely! Have a look at "Broken Genius: The Rise and Fall of William Shockley, Creator of the Electronic Age" by Joel Shurkin. He documents Shockley's days at Caltech during the quantum revolution and seeing speakers like Einstein.